courage, dear heart
by CarrieT
Summary: Short story about Susan, my personal favorite character. Sad, but not dark.


_From the very moment the door was opened, doubt began to cloud her heart. She did not find Narnia, did not stare with childlike awe at a world so enchanting as to take your breath away._

 _She would stand and look around at the seas and the skies and the creatures and wonder. She thought too much, hoped too little. She dangled above the darkness of her own mind, afraid to reach further for fear of losing her grip._

 _She lived within the glass, within her own reflection, something she never doubted. With each passing year, she retreated further and further into herself, further into the mirrors that surrounded her. They told her the girl in the mirror was her only friend, and she believed them. Like a fool, she believed them._

 _Her younger siblings would tell her of their tales, of great ships and distant lands. She would listen, and close her eyes and for just a moment feel the wind in her hair and taste salt on her lips. But the darkness would whisper in her ear, and she would listen and smile and laugh and die inside._

 _Years passed over her like great waves, and she tried to forget. She let the memories fade, and filled their place with even emptier things. She turned her back on Narnia to a world she knew would appreciate her._

 _And so the foolish girl who thought she was a woman got what she wanted at last. She pushed away the hole in her heart, pressed fine linens and sparkling trinkets, and the hands of people she did not love to her chest, trying to heal the ache._

 _She avoided them, the rest of her kin. She often dreamt of their soft smiles, soured by the sight of her. She wanted to love them again, to love herself, but she could not._

 _She considered herself unworthy of the Pevensie name._

 _All get what they want. They do not always like it._

 _One day they were gone. Their was a drunk, and a crash, and her last threads of hope were severed by a railway car hurtling down the tracks into oblivion. She wept for hours, for days, for years after the funeral, woke up clutching the sheets as she had once held the hands of her dearest friends._

 _She could not face the girl in the mirror anymore, so she would turn away, afraid to see the shame that lingered in every hollow in her face._

 _In time, the girl finally did become a woman. A woman who lost her looks to age and sorrow, grew weaker and weaker as she aged, whose tired eyes would cloud over with pain and sorrow each time she smiled._

 _Eventually she stopped smiling._

 _And still, she hoped. She would peek in every wardrobe, and pause at every lion statue and lamppost, and feel something other than pain for the tiniest moment. But she would regret and wish and weep when the wardrobes held coats and the lions remained weathered bronze._

 _The woman let go of the girl._

 _The girl grew up alone_

 _She was dying now, nearing the merciful end of an existence she had never deserved. She can barely walk anymore, can hardly push open the door to the shop._

 _Nothing more than a sad, weary smile can be offered to the friendly shop keeper whose bright eyes remind her of her brother._

 _She wanders alone through the store, wondering._

 _And then she finds it._

 _The carved doors and weathered handles she remembers, memories all too clear. Her heart stirs, and she can just remember what happiness felt like. She lets hope rise within her, wobbling on feeble wings and singing faintly as she traces the patterns with gnarled fingers._

 _She tastes salt and knows she is crying._

 _And the girl let go of the woman, of her pain, and her sorrow, and her self pity._

 _And the girl who knew she was a girl forgave herself at last._

 _She opens the doors, and feels the warm summer air against her skin, the fresh scents of flowers and the cool breeze of Narnia._

 _There are voices she knows well, calling her home._

 _Her hair grows long and strong, her limbs are young and her face is as beautiful as the first day she believed._

 _Their arms are there to catch her, and hold her as she clutches the lion's mane and cries._

 _And she remembers her real place._

 _And the foolishly wise little girl found her way home._


End file.
